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150,000 students take part in Enviro-Spellathon

More than 150,000 students in the country’s Capital have taken part in this year’s annual Enviro-Spellathon Programme — an increase of 106 per cent since the project was launched in 2001.

According to the agency, the 12th edition of the annual programme, organised by Environment Agency – Abu Dhabi (EAD), concluded with the participation of 366 schools and 150,528 students, with the number of schools entering also witnessing an increase of 112 per cent since its inception.

“The Enviro-Spellathon is one of our longest running educational programmes. With our aim of creating a generation of environmentally aware leaders of tomorrow, it is essential that we have a long-term planning mindset. With our programmes, we follow these generations from the youngest stages through to university, equipping them with the knowledge and skills that will empower them to champion sustainable development in the Emirate of Abu Dhabi,” said Director of the Environmental Outreach Division at EAD Fozeya Ibrahim Al Mahmoud.

She added the annual event was a curriculum integrated educational programme targeting school students from the ages of four to 13 in the Emirate of Abu Dhabi. It aims to increase children’s’ environmental knowledge and to instill environmentally friendly behaviour in them from a young age. Since its inception, the Enviro-Spellathon has run in collaboration with the support of the Abu Dhabi Education Council (ADEC) and Shell Abu Dhabi. This year’s edition saw EAD distribute more than 151,000 awards and certificates to students and coordinators to recognise their efforts in becoming more environmentally aware.

“While participation rates continue to rise year on year, we do not measure our success in numbers. It is the students who reaffirm to us their interest in the environment, the teachers who value the knowledge that EAD contributes to the student’s educational experience, and the parents who are proud that their children are given the tools to enable them to become responsible citizens in the future,” Al Mahmoud explained.

For the past 18 years, and through close collaboration with its partners, EAD has been offering schools environmental education programmes such as the Enviro-Spellathon, the Annual Environment Competition, and the Sustainable Schools Initiative. The EAD recently introduced its Sustainable Campus Initiative aimed at universities. -news@khaleejtimes.com

Spellathon’s seven themes

Waste

Wildlife of the UAE

Wildlife in Cities

Wildlife of the Desert

Wildlife of the Seas

Water is Precious

Managing our Waste